AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Are you Mr. Slater?”
“Mr. Slater’s my dad. Please call me Nikolas.”
“Right. Nikolas.” She clasped and unclasped her hands beneath that round belly, before glancing around. As if realizing she hadn’t stepped fully inside, she finally did so, then turned to carefully close the door.
His intrigue grew apace with his curiosity. “And you are?” he finally asked.
“Oh. Sorry.” She closed the rest of the distance between them, her hand out. “I’m Nova. Nova Ellis.”
Although she shook with her right hand, she’d lifted her left to rest on the top of her belly and he couldn’t help noticing there wasn’t a wedding ring.
Or any ring, for that matter.
Which might be explained by her pregnancy weight, but somehow he didn’t think so. There was no white line on her ring finger.
He let her hand drop, impressed by the solid handshake from such a small woman. No shy, retiring hothouse violet here. “How can I help you, Nova?”
“I’m looking for my father.”
Not her baby’s father. Her father. “I might be able to do something about that. When did he go missing?”
“I’m not sure.”
“I thought you were looking for him.”
“Well, I am. But I’ve never met him and he’s never met me. He doesn’t even know about me.”
Realistically, there was little he could do for her. He’d give her the number for a national adoption organization and send her on her way. Which had him oddly disappointed their conversation was going to come to such a swift end.
“I’ve got a few people you can reach out to. I don’t typically work on adoption cases but I do have some resources that can connect children with parents if both parties are willing.”
“Sorry.” She shook her head, a pretty little flush creeping up her neck. “I’m messing this up terribly.” Her hand shot out to rest on his arm. “My mother knew who my father was. Before she died last year, she told me about their teenage fling. She never told him about me but she did tell me about him.”
Nikolas gave her his broadest, most professional smile. This one was open-and-shut, and while he was strangely reluctant to send her on her way, he also had a sense that his fees were somehow out of her range. “If you have his name, reach out directly. There’s no reason to pay for an investigator’s services.”
“Um. Well. I think maybe there is.” Her gaze alighted on the small stack of the week’s papers he kept on his waiting room coffee table. The latest story about Ace Colton was on the top, the headline screaming about the apparently guilty Colton heir, who had recently gone into hiding after the gun that had shot Payne was found in his apartment.
Some odd premonition skimmed over his nerve endings before seeming to rest on the back of his head, as warm as his mother’s palm used to be.
In fact, he wasn’t even all that surprised when Nova bent and picked up the paper, turning it so the headline faced him.
“Ace Colton is my father.”
Chapter 2
Nova’s words hung in the air between her and the cute private eye, seeming to expand and fill the space. She wasn’t sure why she’d made such an impact, but something in the utterance of the words “Ace Colton” had stilled Nikolas Slater.
“Excuse me?” he asked, his hazel eyes growing darker by the moment.
Although she suspected there was some sort of confidentiality clause that protected all she might say to him if she were a client, she wasn’t one. Nor did she have the funds to become one, she well knew. It would be worth confirming what she should—or shouldn’t—say. “I can talk to you freely and confidentially, yes?”
He seemed to consider her for a moment and she figured that even if he did find a way to use the information she shared, she’d at least rest secure in the knowledge she’d tried to protect herself.
But she needed answers. And right now that need trumped what might happen later.
“Sure, I’m willing to do that for this conversation.” That darkness cleared somewhat, even if that underlying sharpness she’d sensed in him hadn’t faded one bit. In fact, he practically hummed in anticipation.
“You sure about that?”
